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The 6 Apr 1988 HR announced that actor Eric Stoltz had been cast in the lead role for the sequel to David Cronenberg's 1986 remake of The Fly (see entry), which was based on the 1958 film, and the 1957 short story written by George Langelaan. Chris Walas, who won an Academy Award for creating the special effects makeup for The Fly, made his directorial debut with this picture. According to HR, Cronenberg had been asked to direct the sequel, but was working on another production at the time. According to the 2 Feb 1989 HR, Chris Walas credits The Fly producer Stuart Cornfeld for giving him his first directorial opportunity. Cornfeld reportedly noticed Walas while working on the original film, and recommended him to direct the sequel. Cornfeld arranged for Walas to meet Mel Brooks, whose company, Brooksfilms, produced the original as well as its $12.5 million follow-up. HR reported a twelve-week shooting schedule to begin at Bridge Studios in Vancouver, Canada, with an anticipated Apr 1988 start date. Producers expected to reuse sound stages in Toronto, Canada, where the original film was shot. However, the sequel required a larger facility than was available there at the time, and production shifted to Vancouver.
Principal photography began on 22 Apr 1988, as cited in the 11 May 1988 Var production chart. Filming was completed on 19 Jul 1988, as reported in a 20 Jul 1988 Var news item.
The 6 Feb 1989 HR ...MoreLess

The 6 Apr 1988 HR announced that actor Eric Stoltz had been cast in the lead role for the sequel to David Cronenberg's 1986 remake of The Fly (see entry), which was based on the 1958 film, and the 1957 short story written by George Langelaan. Chris Walas, who won an Academy Award for creating the special effects makeup for The Fly, made his directorial debut with this picture. According to HR, Cronenberg had been asked to direct the sequel, but was working on another production at the time. According to the 2 Feb 1989 HR, Chris Walas credits The Fly producer Stuart Cornfeld for giving him his first directorial opportunity. Cornfeld reportedly noticed Walas while working on the original film, and recommended him to direct the sequel. Cornfeld arranged for Walas to meet Mel Brooks, whose company, Brooksfilms, produced the original as well as its $12.5 million follow-up. HR reported a twelve-week shooting schedule to begin at Bridge Studios in Vancouver, Canada, with an anticipated Apr 1988 start date. Producers expected to reuse sound stages in Toronto, Canada, where the original film was shot. However, the sequel required a larger facility than was available there at the time, and production shifted to Vancouver.
Principal photography began on 22 Apr 1988, as cited in the 11 May 1988 Var production chart. Filming was completed on 19 Jul 1988, as reported in a 20 Jul 1988 Var news item.
The 6 Feb 1989 HR reported that a fourteen-by-nine foot fly was being displayed that day atop the Cineplex Odeon National theater in New York City's Times Square. Stars Eric Stoltz and Daphne Zuniga were expected to appear at the unveiling.
The Apr 1989 Box announced an opening weekend box-office take of $6.7 million.
End credits include the following acknowledgements: “Special Thanks to: The British Film Centre/Bridge Studiosdios, Burnaby, B.C.; Sony Communications Products Co./Sony Corp. of America; Grip & lighting equipment by William F. White Limited; John Erickson; D.G.C.; A.C.T.R.A.; I.A.T.S.E. 667; Wang Canada Ltd.; Ray Morales, M.D.; Roy Siegel; Tom Enns; Roland Digital Group; Tektronix Canada, Inc.; and the many carpenters, painters and drivers who worked on the project. Sincere appreciation to the Motion Picture Studio Production Technicians I.A.T.S.E. Local 891, Vancouver, Canada.”
Actor Frank C. Turner is credited as "Frank Turner" in end credits.
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At Bartok Industries, a woman named Ronnie gives birth, as a team of scientists observe. After delivering a mutant-looking creature, Ronnie dies. The doctors attend to the strange larva, and when they open it, a human newborn emerges. In time, Mr. Bartok assigns Dr. Jainway the task of raising the infant, and instructs her not to treat the boy as a “laboratory animal.” The child, Martin Brundle, grows at an accelerated rate, quickly absorbs new information, and never sleeps. When Bartok greets Martin, he tells the boy to think of him as a father. Martin soon grows tired of the endless tests he endures, telling a scientist named Dr. Shepard that the aptitude tests are too simple for him. Martin creates his own security badge and sneaks out of his room to explore the facility. He enters a room filled with laboratory animals, and befriends a dog. Sometime later, he returns to visit his only friend and finds that the dog has been transferred to a testing room. Remaining hidden, he watches as scientists place the animal into a teleportation pod, and it disappears. When it reappears in a nearby pod, the friendly dog has been transformed into a vicious creature that attacks a scientist. By Martin’s fifth birthday, his genetic mutation causes him to reach full adult maturation. Bartok grants his wish for privacy, and takes Martin out into the world for the first time. He gives the young man his own apartment, and promises he will no longer be under constant scrutiny of the scientists. Bartok offers Martin a job to use ...
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At Bartok Industries, a woman named Ronnie gives birth, as a team of scientists observe. After delivering a mutant-looking creature, Ronnie dies. The doctors attend to the strange larva, and when they open it, a human newborn emerges. In time, Mr. Bartok assigns Dr. Jainway the task of raising the infant, and instructs her not to treat the boy as a “laboratory animal.” The child, Martin Brundle, grows at an accelerated rate, quickly absorbs new information, and never sleeps. When Bartok greets Martin, he tells the boy to think of him as a father. Martin soon grows tired of the endless tests he endures, telling a scientist named Dr. Shepard that the aptitude tests are too simple for him. Martin creates his own security badge and sneaks out of his room to explore the facility. He enters a room filled with laboratory animals, and befriends a dog. Sometime later, he returns to visit his only friend and finds that the dog has been transferred to a testing room. Remaining hidden, he watches as scientists place the animal into a teleportation pod, and it disappears. When it reappears in a nearby pod, the friendly dog has been transformed into a vicious creature that attacks a scientist. By Martin’s fifth birthday, his genetic mutation causes him to reach full adult maturation. Bartok grants his wish for privacy, and takes Martin out into the world for the first time. He gives the young man his own apartment, and promises he will no longer be under constant scrutiny of the scientists. Bartok offers Martin a job to use his exceptional intelligence at Bartok Industries, and informs him of the teleportation device they have been developing for years. He tells Martin that his real father, Seth Brundle, was a brilliant scientist who died with the secrets to how the device worked. However, Martin refers to what happened to the dog who was placed in the machine, and refuses to take part in the project. Bartok begs him to overlook the incident, and gives Martin videotapes of his father discussing his own experience being teleported. After Martin successfully transports a telephone in the pods, he becomes excited and begins working on transporting organic matter. Soon after, he meets another Bartok employee, Beth Logan, and invites her to see the top-secret teleportation device. However, when he demonstrates using a cactus, the plant is mutilated upon transportation. Later, Martin tells Dr. Jainway that he slept for the first time in his life, but she denies that he is undergoing any metabolic changes. In time, Martin discovers that the “transported” dog had not been put out of its misery, as he was told, but is still living in its mutant state, and being studied by scientists. Martin shows the deformed creature affection before gently ending its life. Martin secures a clearance badge for Beth Logan, and demonstrates his achievement by placing a kitten in the machine and successfully teleporting the creature without mutilating it. Beth is impressed, and later goes home with Martin and has sex with him. Soon after, Martin conducts research on whether the teleportation device can be used to eliminate the mutant genes he possesses. He discovers that it is possible, but another human would need to be sacrificed in the process. When Martin notices a wound on his arm is mutating, Dr. Shepard insists it is only an infection. Martin accuses the scientist of patronizing him. Elsewhere, Dr. Jainway informs Bartok that Martin’s mutant chromosomes are no longer dormant, and that his metamorphosis will happen quickly. In time, Beth’s security clearance is revoked by a menacing guard named Scorby, and she is told that her job is being transferred to an offsite building. Afterward, Scorby gives her a videotape showing her and Martin having sex at his apartment. When she tells Martin, he becomes furious that Bartok has continued to keep him under surveillance. He breaks into the vault room, and after threatening several workers, he watches videotapes of himself since childhood. He sees a recording of his father documenting what happened when he experimented with the teleportation pod, and was “spliced” with a fly that had unknowingly entered the device when he initiated it. When Bartok enters, he tells Martin that he will soon become a fly himself, and Martin is disgusted by his excitement at the opportunity to study him. He tells Bartok he used to love him, before fleeing the facility with his newfound strength. The scientists soon discover that Martin has rigged his computer with a password that will destroy his research if they attempt to log in and operate the teleportation device. Meanwhile, Martin arrives at Beth’s home and she witnesses the beginning of his metamorphosis. When he asks for her help, she embraces him, and takes him to see a scientist named Dr. Stathis, who knew his father. Martin asks for his help to find a cure, but Stathis reveals that he hated Martin’s father, and blamed him for stealing his former girl friend, Ronnie. Stathis reveals that Ronnie, Martin’s mother, killed his father when he tried to force her to get into the teleporter so they would be fused together. When Beth insults Stathis for refusing to help Martin, he offers his speculations that the teleportation pods could somehow be used to reverse Martin’s mutation. Martin denies that solution, and Stathis wonders why he would refuse to try his only option. Before insisting they leave, Stathis lends his jeep to the runaways so they can avoid detection by Bartok. Martin later reveals to Beth that in order to save himself, he would have to sacrifice someone else. When they seek shelter at a motel, Martin’s transformation progresses, and he flees to the nearby woods. Beth chases him, insisting she will never leave him. However, as Martin becomes more fly-like and his personality changes, Beth becomes frightened and telephones Bartok, who arrives in a helicopter to transport Martin back to the laboratory. Larvae form around Martin as he reaches the final stages of his transformation. Meanwhile, Beth is placed in a decontamination chamber before being released to Bartok, who threatens her unless she reveals the password to Martin’s computer. When Martin emerges as a fully formed mutant fly, he kills Dr. Jainway. Bartok orders his men not to harm him, as the creature attacks and kills Dr. Shepard and a security guard. He breaks into the teleportation laboratory, and spews acidic vomit on his pursuers, but does not harm Beth when he comes face to face with her. After the fly kills Scorby, Bartok takes the security guard’s gun and shoots it. However, the creature overpowers Bartok, enters the password on Martin’s computer, and gets into the teleportation pod with Bartok. Beth enters the final command to start the teleportation program, and both men emerge as mutants. However, when Beth removes the larvae covering Martin, she sees he has returned to his human state. Bartok, now a mutant, is held captive and observed by scientists.
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Seventy-year-old newspaper tycoon Charles Foster Kane dies in his palatial Florida home, Xanadu, after uttering the single word “Rosebud.” While watching a newsreel summarizing the years during which Kane ... >>

The American Film Institute is grateful to Sir Paul Getty KBE and the Sir Paul Getty KBE Estate for their dedication to the art of the moving image and their support for the
AFI Catalog of Feature Films and without whose support AFI would not have been able to achieve this historical landmark in this epic scholarly endeavor.